Moses Ose Utomi’s fantasy debut The Lies of the Ajungo is a short, beautiful, heart-rending novella set in an Africa-inspired world of magic, monsters and manipulation. In the city of Tutu’s birth, the City of Lies, everyone aged 13 or older must sacrifice their tongue in exchange for a pittance of water from the powerful Ajungo Empire, enough to keep the city just about alive. Days before his 13th birthday, Tutu bravely ventures out from the city in search of water, determined to return a hero and save his ailing mother. Out in the Forever Desert he meets unexpected friends and dangerous enemies, and grows into himself as a man. The truths he learns, however, reveal the true darkness behind the City of Lies and the realities of the Ajungo.
“There is no water in the City of Lies” opens this brilliant story, beautifully setting the scene for a tale that’s part parable, part deceptively dark fantasy. The first chapter lays everything out to give a sense of this world – the powerful Ajungo, the desperate bargain made by the city’s chief, the children who roam the desert searching for water but never return, the blood drought that Tutu’s mother suffers with, and which drives him to make his perilous journey. It’s clear from the start that this is a world of injustice and power imbalance, but it quickly becomes apparent that things are actually far worse, and over the course of his journey Tutu comes to understand the lies that have underpinned his entire world up until now.
Young, naive and utterly inexperienced, Tutu offers a pure, innocent viewpoint on proceedings, capable of great wonder and terrible pain. Through his eyes we meet strangers and discover more about his world, the people who live in its cities and the monsters that roam the desert, and the magic that will help him survive. Watching him grow into himself is wonderfully heartwarming, but watching him grow to understand the truths of his world is utterly heartbreaking, and for all the wonder he experiences it’s the heartbreak and the pain that has the greatest effect on him. Tutu’s world has always been constrained by fear and mistrust, but what he learns on his journey is the extent to which he’s been manipulated and lied to, and what that means for his understanding of the status quo.
For all that this is unquestionably a fantasy story, set in a beautifully-realised secondary world with its own sense of magic and mythology, none of the fantastical elements ever dominate the story. Instead, they simply support a powerful, human tale of a young man learning to open his eyes and decide what he’s prepared to do with what he learns. It also really isn’t heroic fantasy, at least not in the sense of a story that presents its protagonist as a pure hero. In that respect it’s darker than it seems at first glance, as Utomi skillfully moves Tutu along a bleak but utterly believable arc. It’s a book which will undoubtedly reward multiple readings, with resonant themes and a brilliant protagonist, and which delivers an emotional punch far beyond what you might expect from its size. The fact that it’s only the first in a trilogy of novellas is the icing on the cake.
Review copy provided by the publisher
The Lies of the Ajungo is due out from Tordotcom Publishing in March 2023 – check out the links below* to order your copy:
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